KEY QUESTIONS & CONSIDERATIONS FOR ORACLE PLANNING SYSTEM IMPLEMENTATION (MRP/ASCP)

This Post lists a set of key questions which must be asked before designing a planning solution based on Oracle Planning modules (Oracle MRP/ASCP) in discrete Manufacturing environment. The list may not be exhaustive but highlights important areas which must be well understood before starting the solution design phase. Few notes have also been included to emphasize important points.

1 What is the required Forecasting level ? i.e. item, customer, bill-to or ship-to customer location. Higher the forecasting level, higher would be the forecast accuracy but the lower level forecast visibility might be lost, hence it needs to be decided optimally.

2 What is the Forecast bucket to be used ? – e.g. days in short term, weeks in mid term, periods in long term? Bucket must be set optimally

3 What is the Forecast consumption level – item, customer, bill-to or ship-to customer location: this need to be aligned with forecast level.

4 What are the Forecasting rules to be deployed? – statistical (for multiple periods) or Focus (single period)?

5 Any interfaces for importing forecast from external sources? Excel/legacy?

6 Is there any Aggregation/Segregation of forecasts required ?

7 What is the required Consumption mechanism – forward or backward (no. of workdays)?

8 Is there a need for scenario based forecasting – best, planned & worst base scenarios ?

9 Actual Production is on basis of forecast or just for information / comparison purpose?

10 Is there a scenario for Planning bills ? i.e. explode planning bill while loading/copying forecast – planning bill is a way to aggregate demand at higher level to improve forecast accuracy

11 Forecast consumption required for all items or only few selected / critical items?

12 Note: Forecast consumption happens at forecast set level, if same item in different sets,

consumption will be duplicated

13 Note: Overconsumption creates additional demand line (after exhausting backward and then forwards days)

14 How is shipment schedule (MDS) managed?

15 which all sources of demand are considered? – forecast, sales order, spares (manual) demand or Irs

16 How is anticipated build schedule (MPS) managed?

17 Note: MPS is treated as supply for ATP calculations

18 Is there any interface of MPS entries from external systems?

19 Is MDS/MPS relief monitoring required or just manual comparison between MPS/MDS entries and Production orders/shipments?

20 Is “reduce MPS” attribute required?

21 Demand class based consumption or not?

22 Is there a scenario for inter-org material planning?

23 Forecasting is required for spares/sub-assemblies or only for finished goods?

24 Is there a requirement for RCCP (Rough Cut Capacity Planning) against critical resources or all resources? Are there any bottlenecks/critical resources already identified?

25 Note: It is essential to identify MPS level planning items – most often these are independent demand items, critical items, item where more control is required

26 Is there a need to copy the required plan for editing/comparing/analysis before releasing?

27 What are the planning horizons for MPS and MRP planning?

28 Note: Plan over-write option when replanning in consecutive periods?

29 Material should arrive on order start date or operation start date?

30 Are there any item you would not want to be planned from MRP, rather as Min-max or ROP?

31 Note: Planned orders generated on “Lot-for-Lot” concept i.e. planned orders in quantities equal to the net requirements for each day

32 Are any order modifiers being used? Fixed, min, max order qty, fixed days supply?

33 Is there a requirement for kit/phantom items planning?

34 Is there a scenario where both purchasing and in-house manufacturing has to be enabled for certain items ?

35 Are there any bulk items? i.e. not to be individually issued to jobs, rather to “floor stock” expense accounts

36 Is there a scenario for shrinkage rate? i.e. some amount will be scrapped or wasted so planning plans more: total demand = original demand planned order shrinkage+discrete job shrinkage (on supply side)

37 Is there a requirement to plan for safety stock – market hedge planning?

38 Is there any scenario for lot expiry?

39 How is the scenario for long lead time planning handled ?

40 Should ECO have an impact on planning or not? “MRP active” flag to be set at ECO level.

41 Auto release or manual release of planned orders?

42 How are orders firmed i.e. to avoid rescheduling of firmed orders from MPS/MRP.

43 Is constrained based planning required ? If yes, what constraints to be honored.

44 Centralized or decentralized Supply Chain Planning? Or combination of both?

45 Note: Acceptable early days item parameter — in case of advance receipts, controls “rescheduling out” feature to avoid very frequent reschedule-outs and decrease nervousness of planner by having little extra stock in ahead

46 Note: The planning process considers past due supply and demand as if it were due today (in

other words, the start date of the plan)

47 Note: Over-write option only decides over-writing of “firm orders”, planned orders anyway are over-written (i.e. all existing entries deleted), plan never creates “firm” order automatically-always planned.. Firm can be done manually in workbench.

48 Note: lead time percent (generated from calculate mfg lead time program)is used to schedule material requirements at a particular operation and to plan capacity requirements at a particular operation

49 Note: Dynamic lead time calculation based on fixed and variable lead times (computed by BOM calculate lead time programs)

50 component requirement on order start or operation start? – depends on the nature of lead time, for short lead times, order start is better

51 Note: Approved PRs, un-approved/approved Pos are considered as scheduled receipts

52 Note: Purchasing location should be same as location assigned to inventory organization

53 Note: “Promised-by” date is considered as dock date in case both need by and promised by is available

54 Note: post-processing lead time for the item is added to the dock date to determine the planned receipt date

55 Note: Separate planner code recommended for internally sourced items